9,023 research outputs found
A threshold concepts focus to curriculum design: supporting student learning through application of variation theory
The report describes the development and testing of a research-informed curriculum model aimed at improving students' learning of threshold concepts. The project used phenomenographic action research and the variation theory of learning to develop and trial the model with collaboration from three institutional partners
Apparent Violation of the Wiedemann-Franz law near a magnetic field tuned metal-antiferromagnetic quantum critical point
The temperature dependence of the interlayer electrical and thermal
resistivity in a layered metal are calculated for Fermi liquid quasiparticles
which are scattered inelastically by two-dimensional antiferromagnetic spin
fluctuations. Both resistivities have a linear temperature dependence over a
broad temperature range. Extrapolations to zero temperature made from this
linear- range give values that appear to violate the Wiedemann-Franz law.
However, below a low-temperature scale, which becomes small close to the
critical point, a recovery of this law occurs. Our results describe recent
measurements on CeCoIn near a magnetic field-induced quantum phase
transition. Hence, the experiments do not necessarily imply a non-Fermi liquid
ground state.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures; accepted to Phys. Rev. Let
Ferromagnetism, paramagnetism and a Curie-Weiss metal in an electron doped Hubbard model on a triangular lattice
Motivated by the unconventional properties and rich phase diagram of NaxCoO2
we consider the electronic and magnetic properties of a two-dimensional Hubbard
model on an isotropic triangular lattice doped with electrons away from
half-filling. Dynamical mean-field theory (DMFT) calculations predict that for
negative inter-site hopping amplitudes (t<0) and an on-site Coulomb repulsion,
U, comparable to the bandwidth, the system displays properties typical of a
weakly correlated metal. In contrast, for t>0 a large enhancement of the
effective mass, ferromagnetism and a Curie-Weiss magnetic susceptibility are
found in a broad electron doping range. Our observation of Nagaoka
ferromagnetism is consistent with the A-type antiferromagnetism (i.e.
ferromagnetic layers stacked antiferromagnetically) observed in neutron
scattering experiments on NaxCoO2. We propose that `Curie-Weiss metal' phase
observed in NaxCoO2 is a consequence of the crossover from ``bad metal'' with
incoherent quasiparticles at temperatures T>T* and Fermi liquid behavior with
enhanced parameters below T*, where T* is a low energy coherence scale induced
by strong local Coulomb electron correlations. We propose a model which
contains the charge ordering phenomena observed in the system which, we
propose, drives the system close to the Mott insulating phase even at large
dopings.Comment: 24 pages, 15 figures; accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.
Entanglement Sharing and Decoherence in the Spin-Bath
The monogamous nature of entanglement has been illustrated by the derivation
of entanglement sharing inequalities - bounds on the amount of entanglement
that can be shared amongst the various parts of a multipartite system.
Motivated by recent studies of decoherence, we demonstrate an interesting
manifestation of this phenomena that arises in system-environment models where
there exists interactions between the modes or subsystems of the environment.
We investigate this phenomena in the spin-bath environment, constructing an
entanglement sharing inequality bounding the entanglement between a central
spin and the environment in terms of the pairwise entanglement between
individual bath spins. The relation of this result to decoherence will be
illustrated using simplified system-bath models of decoherence.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure v2: 6 pages 2 figures, additional example and
reference
Observations of the structure and evolution of solar flares with a soft X-ray telescope
Soft X ray flare events were observed with the S-056 X-ray telescope that was part of the ATM complement of instruments aboard SKYLAB. Analyses of these data are reported. The observations are summarized and a detailed discussion of the X-ray flare structures is presented. The data indicated that soft X-ray emitted by a flare come primarily from an intense well-defined core surrounded by a region of fainter, more diffuse emission. An analysis of flare evolution indicates evidence for preliminary heating and energy release prior to the main phase of the flare. Core features are found to be remarkably stable and retain their shape throughout a flare. Most changes in the overall configuration seem to be result of the appearance, disappearance or change in brightness of individual features, rather than the restructuring or reorientation of these features. Brief comparisons with several theories are presented
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